Heroes of Millaine

[Llyarden]

The former SIDE agent permitted himself a slight glare towards Stefani, who apparently seemed to find deadlines more of a concern over the wellbeing of the studio staff. "Does this...er, 'ASM7,' have security cameras, Ms Bancroft, and can you or Mr Fairbourne get us into them?" Wilson asked. "It might be worthwhile to see what's going on there before we start thinking of any plans."

"Also, do you have any further details on the skirmish between these...cultists, or whatever they are...and the actors?"

[Quellian-dyrae]

"My understanding is that they're all in the main studio set. It's a pretty big building, but mostly open space. Most of the walls are just movable ones on rollers. It has a roof though. Oh! But I think there are skylights!" She sounded, just, incredibly pleased to be making what she was sure was a critical tactical contribution.

"There are, but I think they're all outside," she answered Wilson. "The film cameras might have picked something up though, maybe, but I don't know how to access them from here. And...let me check with Lucas." She stood silent for several seconds, then said, "He said it mostly happened too fast for him to get many details. The light controller guys mostly shot light beams. And there were bright flashes whenever they punched someone. He also said some of them carried swords made of light, but they didn't use them on anyone."

[Capt. Infinity]

"It's a film studio, Wilson. Of COURSE it has security cameras." Maestro says, not pressing further because he's pretty sure from the way Wilson worded the question, he didn't actually know what ASM7 was. "Though the filming ones do sound more useful. And as for getting the lay of the land, I'll handle that right now. I trust there's no objections from our lovely guest, seeing as this is the quickest way to solve things?" And, without really waiting for an answer, Maestro begins tapping away on the meeting room table's Active Crystal display, effortlessly bringing up the film camera footage he wanted.

Spoiler: OOC

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That's a 30 once again. Whatt'ya got for me?

[Hyperbolic sine]

Twelve hellish days.

If Declan had wanted to become a TV celebrity, he wouldn't have gone to a military academy. He isn't really good at dealing with people given his penchant for speaking his mind, and this incident proved it once again: after being constantly nagged about making some sort of declaration, he gave in and said what he thought. Turns out that stating that "[...] in order for the threat of lethal force to be an effective deterrent, it must go beyond the stage of threat if the situation warants it. Otherwise what's the point?" was like throwing gasoline on a fire. Since then, he put double the effort in accurately avoiding the press (and the Assembly publicists); at least he had new gym equipment, didn't have to change the target at the firing range after every two bursts from the DAMOCLES, the threats he recieved were somewhat funny, and his family was left out of the whole thing. Oh, and the results of the investiagion were more or less matching his theory, so he had a couple of opportunities to utter a "told you so".

---

"What if I just walk in and let them exaust themselves by trying to burn me?" Declan asks with a shrug, as Maestro does his hacking thing. "And if it turns out that they can hurt me, I suppose we still gain valuable intel."

[Zelphas]

Waterworks' smile briefly became a grin at Declan's "Waterwoman" comment, but she otherwise said nothing, helping to clear up the debris as much as possible before facing the press.

---

The fun thing about being able to travel almost instantaneously through any body of water was that it was hard to be followed in a city filled with pipes and means of transporting water. Darla did her best to avoid the press for the next twelve days, always sounding extremely uncomfortable when she was forced on screen.

The attack at the studio comes almost as a relief, though Waterworks also frowns at the coincidental nature of all of these attacks. "I can do some physical scouting, too, if you want," she offers. "It might let us know what these light guys are actually planning to do before we bust in and stop them."

[manwithaplan]

Much like Darla, Tom was capable of sliding almost entirely free of the media's grasp for the next twelve days, never forced to say anything of significance.

The problem with that, of course, is that dodging people all the time meant he hardly even saw any Dreamers, let alone touched any. It seemed to be all he could think about over the last couple days, and any member of his team who looked closely during the meeting with Stefani would notice his fingers seemed a little shaky.

"Those are both good ideas, so I say we do both," he said, nodding at Waterworks and the Unbreakable. "Unbreakable goes in and tanks them while Waterworks sneaks in another way, scouting the place out. And...Oh! Meanwhile, I could use Waterworks' power to take one of their powers, so we know exactly what they can do. Yes!"

As he mentioned taking Waterworks' powers he automatically raised a hand to reach for her, only to hold back. He wasn't some ravenous pig, after all.

[Zelphas]

Waterworks is observant enough to notice Copycat's shaky hands, but figures he is just nervous after the last fight and doesn't comment on them.

When he reaches out a hand, she responds with a high five, smiling. "Are there any water pipes or other sources of running water on the set itself, or am I going to have to sneak in the old-fashioned way?" she asks Ms. Bancroft, not really sure if she was going to get an actual answer.

[Quellian-dyrae]

"It's our studio anyway. Go for it," Stefani replied to Maestro. "Mmm...how much water? There's sinks and toilets in the restroom, of course. And I think there's a water cooler in the main area."

It didn't take Maestro long to remotely access and hack into the basic corporate-level security on the cameras, security or otherwise, and play back the feeds and video from earlier. The security cameras outside caught the approach of Koloman and his troops. Koloman was a pretty average-looking guy with midtone-dark skin, black hair, and a thin mustache. Kinda lanky. The troupe he stod behind were a mix of genders, but that was about all the disparity between them. They weren't identical, quite, but they could easily pass for siblings. Well, except for the fact that there were two dozen of them. Auras of soft white light shone from every one.

The group was led by a spearhead formation of eight more bigger, bulkier people, wearing full suits of pristine white armor, like holy knights from a storybook. The armored ones all carried swords made of slender beams of golden energy. The auras of light shining from them were both larger and brighter. Their armor concealed their features and blurred their body shape, but they were all within an inch or two of each other in height.

The entire formation marched into the building in lockstep, perfect military synchrony, save Koloman himself.

Inside, the data's a little more fragmented, as it depends mostly on where the cameras were pointing, but between words being spoken, the multiple camera angles available, and - sigh - Koloman actually yelling at the camera crew and then ordering his minions to point the cameras at the scene unfolding ensure that you catch a good bit of it. SIDE was going to laugh about this one for literally weeks.

Short version is, Koloman and his crew walk in, interrupting a scene being filmed. They're off-camera at the time, but Kol goes ranting a bit about how it's "time for his big break" and "this is the script we'll be following today". There's some heckling, and then some low humming noises and flashes of light, some cracking and crackling and shouting and screaming. One of the actors runs off camera, there's some more of the humming noises, a shout of pain and a thud. Kol laughs.

That's when he calls for people to point the cameras that way. There's a generally negative response of the "you're insane" variety, and then a couple of the unarmored glowy guys walk past the cameras and they turn to face Kol and his crew, with the actor down on the ground, although he's conscious trying to stand. Kol calls out some of the other actors, taunting them about how they're "not actual Heroes, they just play them on TV", and challenging them to take their shot. There's a few quietly spoken words from the set, and then the other four actors who were on screen originally run, fly, or teleport into camera view. The armored guys meet them, and there's a painfully brief fight, four of the armored guys holding them off and pounding on them, blinding light flashing from their fists with each blow, while the other four blast them with laser beams. None of them are really seriously hurt, but it takes the fight out of them pretty quick.

One guy, looks like he might be a stage hand of some kind, gets behind Koloman in the commotion and actually takes a swing at him with a microphone stand, but the light controller hears him at the last second and dodges it - barely - before blinding the guy with a flash of light. It's not nearly as bright as the ones his minions threw, but it does the job, and Koloman mocks the guy for trying to take him on without any powers.

There's not much else in the way of tactically valuable information. Koloman's goons spread out, and what follows is basically an argument between Kol and the director, Kol trying to force/convince him to run his script, Lucas pretty clearly just stalling for time, actually reading the thing and making comments on it, calling out things that need to be changed, and so on. Kol's clearly getting agitated, but he doesn't seem to recognize that he's being stalled.

Spoiler: OOC

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And may as well bring up now, Koloman's personal powers, if it isn't clear, are puny. While he's got enough plot armor that he isn't Minion status, he is subject to lethal damage. The goons receive nonlethal damage by default as normal, although the unarmored ones are Minions.

Spoiler: Assessment DC 10

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The unarmored goons are PL 5 Minions.

The armored goons are PL 8.

Spoiler: If you beat DC 15

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Marvin is so helpless it's almost cute PL 2.

The unarmored goons have no tradeoffs.

The armored goons have a two-point Toughness and Fortitude shift.

Spoiler: If you beat DC 20

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Marvin has a one-point defense tradeoff.

The goons stats are all PL appropriate.

Spoiler: If you beat DC 25

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Marvin's Fortitude is a point below PL.

[Hyperbolic sine]

"And after I draw them all near me, Maestro can drop the gas canister. Quick and effective." Declan says, nodding. Even if the gas bypassed his immunity to poisons, he just needs to hold his breath...and he can do that indefinitely. "So, where is this studio?" he then adds, turning to Stefani.

[Capt. Infinity]

"Wow... This is... Pretty pathetic, actually." Maestro states, as he brings the video footage he managed to gather on-screen. Near as I can tell, the vast majority of these folks are pretty damn mook-y. Koloman himself looks particularly squishy, I suggest going non-lethal if we want him in one piece." He explains, trying not to dwell on the issue of what would happen if they DID use lethal force in an attempt to keep the now-healing wounds closed. "The real problem here are these eight paladin-looking dudes. If we can take out the goons easily that would make them a heck of a lot easier to deal with." He turns to Wilson. "I like Declan's idea but I want your advice as to the range I want to put on this gas disperser. Now, off the top of my head, I could whip up a fairly potent knockout gas, but it would have a lot to do with concentration" Maestro explains. "I can have it have an effective range of 30 feet and have it be almost assured to knock everyone caught in the blast out cold, I could double the range, but make it 2/3 as effective, or I could QUADRUPLE the range, but have it only be 50% as effective. Your thoughts, mister military man?" The young man asks, resting his chin on fist, keeping eye level with Wilson.

[Llyarden]

Wilson mused to himself, peering down at the security footage. "Max power...the armoured guys might shrug that off, but you'd probably take the others out. Half power and the only one you'd be pretty certain of taking down would be Kol. In between, you'd probably take down the unarmoured guys too but it would be a close thing." He gave a shrug. "Don't suppose you can give it multiple settings and we can see which one to use when we get there? I don't know how all these gizmos work."

"Oh, and Declan? Like Maestro said, for the love of the Promise don't shoot Kol. I'd be risking killing him with this." He gestured to his sidearm. "And he's likely to be the most talkative, if we can interpret his ravings at least."

[Zelphas]

Waterworks shudders theatrically at the mention of toilets and sinks. "I'll have to shower for a week...again," she complains, ending with a grin.

As Maestro shows the footage, Waterworks is struck with an idea. "Hey, all of these people look a little too similar, don't they?" she asks. "What if we're not dealing with a group of people with similar powers, but only with two or three people with similar powers, one of which includes making copies? I don't know if that changes anything but I just thought I'd bring it up."

She glances towards the others, then realizes that they were talking about something entirely different. "Oh, sorry, gas canisters. Umm, I'm not sure; if they're all grouped close enough together, though, you can't go wrong with full strength."

[Capt. Infinity]

Waterworks shudders theatrically at the mention of toilets and sinks. "I'll have to shower for a week...again," she complains, ending with a grin.

As Maestro shows the footage, Waterworks is struck with an idea. "Hey, all of these people look a little too similar, don't they?" she asks. "What if we're not dealing with a group of people with similar powers, but only with two or three people with similar powers, one of which includes making copies? I don't know if that changes anything but I just thought I'd bring it up."

She glances towards the others, then realizes that they were talking about something entirely different. "Oh, sorry, gas canisters. Umm, I'm not sure; if they're all grouped close enough together, though, you can't go wrong with full strength."

"Wait wait, no, you're point is very valid Waterworks. I too have no idea what the heck is up with that. Honestly at this point I wouldn't be surprised if they were all clones who's DNA had been jacked up somehow with Koloman's powers. Either way, it merits further investigation after the fact." Maestro explains to Darla, attempting to make everyone feel valid in this conversation.

[Llyarden]

"Be nice if we knew what we were walking into, but I don't think they'll be kind enough to tell us beforehand," said Wilson. "Incidentally, I reckon I can take out the unarmoured guys pretty easily if we can get close enough. And at the speed I plan on flying in, we should get close enough. So if I were you I'd worry about taking out the armoured folk with your gas bomb."

[Hyperbolic sine]

"Don't shoot Kol, noted. I will still punch him if he gets in the way, though." Declan replies. "Well, I'm ready when you are. Just say the word."

[Quellian-dyrae]

Stefani provides directions to the studio. It's about six miles away.

[Llyarden]

Wilson considered heading downstairs to summon a vehicle, but then remembered that the press would probably be waiting to ambush them. He'd been avoiding them thus far by the simple expedient of flying everywhere. "Unless Maestro has another new toy to try out, I'll be on the roof. Should be able to get us there in...er, say about 20 seconds? Traffic's awful this time of day." He gave a polite nod to Stefani and headed to the roof if he could get there, or a balcony or similar if he couldn't. He was allergic to reporters.

Spoiler: Dropship

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Innate Growth 4 - 9 points
Flight 10 - 20 points
Power-lighting 4 - 4 points
Concealment 4 (Visual, Limited (only provides the occupants with Concealment, not the vehicle itself)) - 4 points
Enhanced Agi 2, Enhanced Dex 2 - 8 points.

[Capt. Infinity]

Maestro gives an awkward smile. "Uh, could you possibly make that 20 seconds and 81 minutes? Because it's going to take me exactly that long to formulate and produce about 10 of those knockout bombs."

[Zelphas]

Waterworks looks at Maestro, one eyebrow slightly upraised. "Alrighty then... while you're doing that, I can at least get some on-the-spot recon done. Back in a few minutes!" She walks quickly into the nearest bathroom, touching the sink and vanishing.

four sewer grates and one upper-class restaurant kitchen later, Waterworks pours herself silently out of the bathroom sinks on the studio set, moving carefully in the hopes of remaining undetected.

Spoiler: OOC

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Waterworks' teleport has the max range of 1 mile, so she jumped out in five other places before getting to the studio set.

Stealth: (1d20+20)[39]

Perception: (1d20+10)[13]

[Quellian-dyrae]

Waterworks slipped onto the set easily, neither Marvin nor any of his goons so much as glancing in her direction. The goons were pretty much scattered about, most of them standing guard over various actors and staff members, with four of the armored ones surrounding the actors who had tried to fight. Two of them were flanking Marvin, who stood on the set, yelling at the director as the latter continued reading through the script and giving comments and critiques, keeping his voice impressively calm throughout.

[Capt. Infinity]

"...You know, on second thought, fast arrival is good. I've got a better idea as to taking out the guys safely anyway. Just drop me off on the roof before you all come in through the ceiling... Which I assume is the plan, given that there IS a precedent at this point." Maestro state, not about to miss any of the action.

[Llyarden]

"Wait, wait, what?" Wilson had started to say, before Maestro changed his mind. "Well I hope this idea doesn't take 81 minutes. And I was planning on going through the door myself. Er...if it's open, at least. Otherwise I may have to make some in-flight modifications."

[Hyperbolic sine]

"I thought we were going in through the door too, but I don't care either way. I don't know for how much this Lucas will be able to stall them, so we should hurry." Declan states, then turns to Maestro as if he just remembered something. "Oh, can you shut down the cameras? Or isolate the signal, or something? I've had a hundred lives' share of spotlight these last days, I'd rather avoid someone airing the battle."

[Capt. Infinity]

"Uh, guys?" Maestro questions as he begins levitating on a psychic platform. "You do remember I can FLY now, right? Just drop me off just before we're on top of the building and I'll get into position on the roof. Easy as pie." He acknowledges Declan's request "Don't you think it could go the other way? That the LACK of incriminating evidence will be taken as you having something to hide? Reporters are tricky, and I think it would be best to try and offset the bitterness in their mouths rather than leave it there and hope they forget about it. Because trust me, they won't."

[Zelphas]

Waterworks looks quickly all around the set, before quietly returning to the sinks and slipping away.

"The bad guys are all spread out, guarding several groups of hostages," she reports to her team as soon as she re-forms nearby. "Four of the armored guys are guarding the actors who tried to fight, and two of them are with what's-his-face, the ringleader. He's talking to the director, and I'll say it right now, if they ever make a movie about us, I want this guy to direct." A grin spreads across her face. "He's actually criticizing the crazy guy's script! This director definitely gets points for sheer audacity."

[Capt. Infinity]

Maestro grins. "I like a man who can look crazy in the face and tell it to straighten its shirt. Now, if there are no further objections, I suggest that we all rally on the roof for some hypersonic transportation. All in favour?" The young genius asks, raising his hand in a mock gesture of agreement at his own idea.

[Hyperbolic sine]

"He's got guts, that much is true." Declan says, with an approving nod, before slightly raising his hand. "Yeah, yeah, whatever, as long as we get there quickly."

[Zelphas]

Waterworks is about to agree, but a thought strikes her and she grins instead. "I'll meet you guys there. when you drop in, aim for the armored guy to the crazy guy's left. Hopefully, I'll make him feel a little thirsty before you arrive." With that and a cheery wave, Waterworks is gone through the water systems and back to the studio once more.

Before hitting the armored person, Waterworks takes stock of the situation to make sure nothing has changed.

Spoiler: OOC

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Stealth: (1d20+20)[40]

Perception: (1d20+10)[26]

[Llyarden]

"All aboard," Wilson said with a grin, as his new vehicle took shape. Maestro might have noted that it bore a certain similarity to the vehicle that had taken them to Helping Hands, although in Wilson's trademark matte black material. Once the roof (which had flipped backwards to allow entry) was sealed, it would be impossible to tell who was inside.

[Capt. Infinity]

"All it's missing is cupholders." Maestro muses, taking stock of the Dropship's interior as he got comfortable in his seat in preparation for his very short flight, and early dismount, in order to get into position on the roof.